On the way from x-c'ing today
Ladukebob
Registered Users Posts: 67 Big grins
I stopped and took a few shots of this big open area. And with the gray skies and lack of color I converted them to b&w. Traveling light all I had was my 35mm so these got cropped about 30% to get rid of too much snow in the fore ground. I'm really new to b&w's so let me know what you think.
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Thanks
Dan
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Thanks
Dan
Nikon D90
18-105 mm
85 mm 1.8
10-20 mm
35 mm 1.8
18-105 mm
85 mm 1.8
10-20 mm
35 mm 1.8
0
Comments
Probably a little boring maybe.
18-105 mm
85 mm 1.8
10-20 mm
35 mm 1.8
i find them a bit dark and lacking contrast.
i like the subject in the foreground of trees in the 2nd shot, but wonder if you could isolate them more from the darker background. perhaps a tighter crop.
just my thoughts...
Washington, D.C., based landscape and fine art photographer
http://navinsarmaphotography.com/
Also, what I meant was that these were shot using my 35mm f/1.8. Sorry for any confusion.
18-105 mm
85 mm 1.8
10-20 mm
35 mm 1.8
I tweaked the contrast of the three trees a little and I really like it. Thanks for the suggestion.
18-105 mm
85 mm 1.8
10-20 mm
35 mm 1.8
on a scene like this I would have bracketed the hell out of it and possibily ran thru an HDR software.....to me the whites are not truly white...dingy greay and that takes away from the beauty the pix possesses ..... JMHO.....
Thanks for commenting Art.
I arrived at what you see after looking at the photo in NX2, which is the software I use. I know nothing about Photoshop. The colors just weren't there so I converted to b&w and adjusted contrast levels. I also adjusted different areas of the photo to try to get some depth. You mentioned HDR. I use the Photomatix software and I have some experience with colors but it never occurred to me to try it with b&w. You'll got me excited about trying HDR and I might go back to this location and see what can be done.
I understand that this scene isn't all that interesting but it seemed like a good photo to work on and learn.
Thanks
Dan
18-105 mm
85 mm 1.8
10-20 mm
35 mm 1.8
"Out where the rivers like to run, I stand alone, and take back something worth remembering..."
Three Dog Night
www.northwestnaturalimagery.com
When taking photos with lots of snow you need to increase the EC on your camera to +1 or +1.5 or even +2 on a very bright day.
Otherwise the camera's meter is fooled and you end up with dark gray snow.
I took your first photo and brought it into Photoshop. Nothing fancy here - the same histogram is on the back of your camera.
Here's the histogram from the first image:
As a quick lesson the left side of this graph (or histogram) has a value of 0 and represents black. The far right will have a value of 255 and represents white.
There are 3 channels for Red, Green and Blue, but put that aside for the moment.
Notice on the graph that your highest values are only about 2/3 of the way across. In fact the highest value was 169. 169 will look gray.
So these are just underexposed images.
Next time dial in some +EC until the histogram just gets up to the right (but doesn't go past it) and you'll have some pure white snow. I suspect this will really help.
best,
www.finesart.com
The sky looks like it does because of the really low cloud cover that comes all the way down to the tops of the trees.
18-105 mm
85 mm 1.8
10-20 mm
35 mm 1.8
That last redo is really good, IMO. Being from WI myself, these shots remind me of...the building I work in...wait a second... ;-) In all seriousness, I do like the overall series.
As for the conversion, you may want to take a look in the Street & PJ forum. A lot of the folks there are in love with B&W. I've learned a lot about doing a cleaner conversion just from looking at the shots posted in there.
SteveF, thank you for the Histogram lesson! I'm going to be utilizing that for my 'winter wonderland' shots. :-)